Introduction
Plant production is facing unprecedented challenges. In 2050, the human population will exceed nine billion and the demand for agricultural production will increase by 60%. In addition, climate change will limit local plant production, demanding the development of crops with higher tolerance to e.g. heat, drought, and flooding. At the same time, there is a strong need to reduce the environmental impact of agriculture and preserve natural habitats.
The present PhD course will provide an update on the state-of-the-art methods to uncover the genetic basis of agronomic traits and introduce them into new or existing crops using biotechnology. Special focus will be on wild or semi-domesticated crops as well as gene editing systems in plants. The course will include participation in a 1-day international symposium, including a coaching session on poster preparation and delivery.
Course contents
The course will cover topics such as:
Genetic resources for crop improvement
Overview of mapping of agronomic traits
Omics-based gene discovery
Transformation of wild and semi-domesticated crops
Update on the CRISPR-based toolbox for gene editing
Intellectual property rights
Learning outcomes
After the course, the PhD students will be able to:
Identify the main challenges faced when working with wild and semi-domesticated crops
Describe the workflow of biotechnological strategies for crop improvement
Describe the main challenges associated with plant tissue culture and transformation
Identify the advantages and disadvantages of different gene editing protocols
Propose biotechnological improvement strategies for their own projects
Invited international speakers include:
Dan Voytas, College of Biological Sciences, University of Minnesota, USA
Caixia Gao, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China
Nils Stein, Leibniz Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research (IPK) Gatersleben, Germany
John A. Doebley, College of Agricultural and Life Sciences, University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA
The invited international speakers will be joined by a selected group of experts from UCPH and Århus University participating in the NNF-funded NovoCrops centre (www.novocrops.com) or related large initiatives.
Course organizers
Rosa López-Marqués (rlo@plen.ku.dk) and Fernando Geu-Flores (feg@plen.ku.dk).
Registration
Please register and sign up for the event via the website https://eventsignup.ku.dk/novocrops2022/conference
If you have any questions regarding to registration, please contact Xu Zhai (zhai@plen.ku.dk)
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